When We Live Such Fragile Lives
by Violet Silhouette
Summary: Crime rings, bullet wounds, feelings that just shouldn't exist. Just another tale in Nancy Drew's life.
1. Chapter 1

So this came to me as an idea while I was on vacation. Don't ask why, I really can't say why. It just did. I'm not sure if this can work out to be a long-term fic, so review it and tell me what you think! (:

Rating: T for language, and future mild sexual references.

Disclaimer: As if I own anything mentioned.

**Four years earlier – location: Chicago, Illinois**

Bulletproof vests had never been one of Nancy Drew's favorite clothing items. Thankfully, her private investigator career didn't usually require her to wear one unless she was working with the police or potentially dangerous suspects. Fortunately those types of suspects weren't common around the River Heights area. At times like these though, she found herself in need to travel to other places to crack her cases. What had started off as a small River Height burglary had turned into a national theft ring, one that led Nancy to Chicago.

There she got into contact with the FBI, who reluctantly agreed to have her help out on the case. They had originally refused to take her with them, considering she was but a nineteen year old amateur detective from a small town.

What had convinced them to change their minds had been the appearance of her long-time friends and fellow detectives Frank and Joe Hardy. Similar events had occurred around the Bayport area, and they too had been led to Chicago on the case. Running into them was a surprising turn of events, but a welcome one nonetheless for Nancy.

That was how Nancy found herself to be standing on the John Hancock Center building in a bulletproof vest and a headset on her head. They had tracked down the leaders of the theft ring to their hideout, only to find that they had hidden and were now trying to take down the FBI themselves. Apparently being a good sniper was a requirement to be a top boss in the theft business, since the FBI agents found themselves having to duck every few seconds from incoming bullets.

With some SWAT team members, Nancy had made her way to the top of the building in hopes to pick up the sniper's location and pass the knowledge along to the FBI agents waiting on the street for their destination. Joe was among them, whereas Frank was with Nancy on the roof.

'_Two good pairs of eyes are always better than just one Nan. Plus I'm sure Ned would be happier knowing you've got someone watching your back out here with that sniper running around,' _

Were the words he had employed to convince her to take him along. She had wanted to have the least amount of people with her to go up on the roof. More people meant more attention would be drawn to them. Already the FBI had forced some SWAT guys to go with her with shields in the case of bullets, and they would only slow her down. When Frank and Joe offered to go with her she had easily convinced Joe to help out the FBI agents on the streets, but Frank was a different story.

Although he claimed that what Ned would prefer was of importance to him, Nancy could clearly tell his real purpose through his tone.

'I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I let anything happen to you and not do anything about it.'

It almost made Nancy believe that he really and truly cared greatly about her in a special way. She knew all too well though that he meant it out of years of friendship. At least she was trying to convince herself of that. Even if he did mean it as more than a friend, he had Callie he had to get home to, and she had Ned. They both knew that.

Nancy sighed softly as they reached the roof door. In front of her were approximately four SWAT members, with about two more in the rear. Frank was a mere foot to her left, dressed similarly to her with a look of concern on his face.

"Nance maybe you should stay by the door…"

"No Frank. This was my idea and I'm in charge of this operation, so I will go out and look around for this guy."

Nancy replied, casting him a strange look. He knew how she had a tendency to throw herself in dangerous situations all the time and whenever he had been with her he had usually gone along with her without much of a fight. Sure he cared for her safety, but he was well aware of how she took care of herself. Why was he trying to get her to step down this time? As a response he simply shrugged and turned his head to face forward.

Nancy let her eyes linger on him a few moments more, curiosity filling her blue eyes and thoughts running at one hundred miles an hour in her head. The sound of the door creaking open snapped her out of her head to the present situation. The group moved as one onto the open room, shields up towards the edge. Once there they separated slightly, every armed guard posting themselves at small intervals with Nancy and Frank behind them, crouched on the ground.

It took only seconds for the first shot to hit. It hit the shield protecting Frank and ricocheted off with a short but loud sound. Nancy cringed slightly. So maybe the shields had been a good idea, since the shooters seemed to be well aware of their location. How had they been spotted so quickly? Well, it didn't matter now. Nancy had to find their position, and fast.

She peeked from the side of the shield and waited for the next shot. She was rewarded two seconds later when a bullet hit the shield in front of her about an inch from her peeking face.

"Shoot."

She mumbled as she got herself back behind the shield. Although she was almost hit right in the face, she had been able to pinpoint the general location of the shot. The bullet had ricocheted off to the left, meaning the shot had come from a slight right angle from their position.

Nancy peeked again slightly from behind the shield. There were two possible buildings from this distance, but she wasn't sure which. A sudden movement caught her eye on the left building. It had to be them.

"I think I've got them. Tall gray building off the main street. Looks like two shooters."

She said into the headset. She heard a mumbled reply and shrugged. She had to be positive of her shot though. The FBI team would only get one chance at a surprise entry. The roof's edge was much too low to see on top of the other building properly. She had to back up to see clearly.

Her feet backed up slowly, keeping her eyes on the building. She ignored the words around her to get back behind the shield, even Frank's. Mistakes weren't permitted with the FBI, and she wasn't about to get herself on their bad side. She only needed another two or three steps, she could almost see figures on the roof.

That was when the bullet hit her.

Either her bulletproof vest was terrible or they were using military bullets. Either way Nancy found herself thrown backwards with arms spread eagle-like, her entire body falling back on her heels. She could feel the place where the bullet had penetrated her skin, somewhere right below her chest.

All she saw were black dots dancing around her vision, which was also getting blurrier with every passing second. She didn't feel the impact of the ground beneath her back. All she heard was a voice. A voice she recognized. Frank's voice.

"NANCY! NANCY ANSWER ME!"

She tried opening her mouth to answer him, but she found herself to be short of breath. She started sucking in as much air as she could to try and breathe right, but it wasn't working. She was hyperventilating with no solution in sight. Everything was turning black and she could hardly stay conscious. Only Frank's voice seemed to penetrate her mind.

"NANCY! Why didn't I just go after you….DAMMIT!"

It was then that she completely blanked out.


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you to the ones who reviewed the first chapter! It may have been a while since I updated this (ok ok a long while) but I hope the length of this makes up for the wait. I'll update as soon as I can now that the semester is over. So enjoy chapter two, which has a main focus on Frank & Joe :)

Disclaimer: Nothing belongs to me. Nothing. At all.

* * *

**Present day – location: Bayport**

It wasn't the first time Joe had needed to leave the office to go and get Frank. His brother may have been the most straight-minded of the out of two of them once upon a time, but ever since the whole Callie dilemma two years ago Frank had some days where he just…wasn't the same.

Stepping up to the door of the two person apartment Frank lived in alone, Joe shifted through his pockets to find his set of keys. After a few moments (and after having found his long lost cleaner's ticket) Joe took out the lone key and opened the door to his older brother's apartment.

Everything was intact and spotless, just the way Frank liked it. The blonde gave a quick look around the place, noticing the empty kitchen sink and the untouched coat still on its hanger. Joe sighed before heading down the hallway towards his brother's room.

"Frank?"

He pushed the bedroom's door open and walked in, finding Frank exactly as he had expected – sitting on the edge of his bed and staring blankly at the wall in front of him. This was how he had found him two years ago in the apartment the two of them had shared when he had learned about Callie.

* * *

**Flashback – two years previous**

"Frank? Everything alright?"

Joe entered Frank's bedroom only to find the eldest Hardy sitting quietly on the edge of his bed, hands clasped together in front of him and his face a blank slate as he stared at the wall.

"They got her."

"Got who?"

"Callie."

"Wha-how? Is she ok? Where is she?"

Wordlessly Frank stood up and walked over to the phone, pressing the answering machine button and settling back in the same spot he had gotten up from. Joe's blue eyes observed his brother with concern before turning his attention to the message currently being played on the machine.

"_Frank? It's Callie. I…I'm going to be away for a while. A long while. I just…I…I need to get away from Bayport. Don't call me to ask where I'm going. I…I won't tell you. I wish I could have met Laura, she…she sounds like such a great person. And you were amazing of course, don't think for a second that you aren't. I'm going to miss you. More than words can ever express. I love you. Do you hear me Frank Hardy? I love you. Goodbye."_

Joe stood there for a few moments, bewildered. It had sounded like the sweet voice of Callie Shaw, but it lacked the general lightness he had always attributed to the girl. It took a few seconds for him to gather his thoughts and string together a coherent sentence.

"But Callie met mom."

Of all the comments to say. Way to go, Joe.

"It was our phrase she would say if she was being forced to leave Bayport because of some guy who's after me. It wasn't supposed to ever be used. It was just a precaution…"

"We'll get her back. I swear. Callie's a strong girl, she'll be fine."

* * *

**Present day**

And she had been alright. Once they had gone through all of the trouble of locating the theft ring and getting the information they needed. Apparently the theft ring they had taken down in Chicago hadn't been taken down fully, and it was one of the remaining guys from that ring that had gotten a hold of Callie.

It had been a rough two weeks following the phone call. Every second awake had been spent on trying to locate either Callie or the guy behind her disappearance. The local grocery store owner came to have an attachment to Joe, who would wind up in his store once every two or three days to buy more coffee. Finally, after thirteen days, six hours and fourteen minutes of searching (Joe had calculated everything) they managed to get a lead on the whereabouts of the man. A shiver ran down Joe's spine at the memory of how everything had gone down.

* * *

**Flashback – two years previous**

"Where is she? Tell me!"

Frank's voice resonated throughout the empty warehouse. Joe was hiding on a balcony higher up from the scene, ready to barge in should something go wrong, although he couldn't see how that could really happen. The had followed all the leads to a warehouse which the theft ring had been using as a home base, and without much trouble had taken down the bodyguards in the warehouse until they reached the man in charge. Leo Duffy.

_'With a name like that no wonder he's become a bully.'_

"_Can it, Joe."_

It had almost been too easy to get to him, and sure enough when the two boys walked into the final room of the warehouse, Leo was simply sitting a chair, staring at the pair.

"I was wondering when you would show up Mr. Hardy."

And things had only gone downhill from there. Leo mocked Frank the entire time, but it wasn't until he pulled a gun out of his breast pocket that Joe started getting worried and dashed towards his brother, who remained motionless in front of the ring leader. What made Joe stop in his tracks was the fact that Leo wasn't aiming the gun at Frank, instead he was handing it to him.

"You are mad about your friend. The pretty blonde-what was her name? Cassandra...Carole..."

"Callie."

"Yes, yes. Callie. Well here is your chance to take your revenge. You can shot me right now. Nobody will know, and you will have gotten rid of me."

His brother would never have shot someone intentionally. Not like this. Joe had to remind himself that this just wasn't Frank. Not the one he had grown up with anyway. That Frank was lost somewhere in the guy whose hand was hovering by the gun.

"I don't care for your revenge. Tell me where she is."

"At the proximity you're at shooting a bullet at a straight angle to my heart would kill me instantly."

"Dangerous with a gun deadly with geometry."

Joe muttered as he watched the scene unfold in front of him, not wanting to get any closer in case Frank would get distracted and lose focus from the man in front of him.

"Where. Is. She."

A smirk was the only response he got from Leo Duffy.

"TELL ME!"

The shout surprised even Joe. It wasn't like Frank to shout. Leo's laugh followed moments later, with a short cough.

"No...you can't just bite your stupid tooth like in the movies and die. No..No no no...TELL ME WHERE SHE IS!"

"I'm afraid time has run out Mr. Hardy. Rest assured that Ms. Shaw will live..."

Leo Duffy never got to finish his sentence.

* * *

**Present day**

Oh, they had managed to find Callie afterward and get her back to Bayport. There was just something off with her ever since then. Or more specifically, there was something off with her and Frank both. Maybe that was what pushed the two away. When she came back the two of them promised that it wouldn't get in between them. That nothing could.

But it did.

And nothing Joe or Vanessa could do would help them.

They simply drifted apart until the distance between them was unable to be shortened. It was a mutual separation, one without insults or shouts like in the movies. The two had shared on last kiss before going off their separate ways, and although Frank didn't fall into a deep state of sadness as Joe had thought might happen, there were times like these where he thought back to it and fell in a state of unawareness.

"Frank? What's up?"

His brother blinked once and looked up at his brother, the empty look gone.

"I..."

He turned his head towards the bedside table, towards the phone.

"Not again. Frank..is it Callie?"

A confused look crossed the eldest Hardy's face but was soon replaced with an expression of realization. So no, this wasn't about Callie. Frank didn't seem to be inclined to move and start the machine, so Joe took it upon himself to start the message.

_'Frank?'_

Joe froze. The voice was familiar, much too familiar. He could see Frank stiffen slightly before relaxing, although it was obvious enough that he recognized the voice too.

_'I asked Fenton for your number and he gave it to me. I need your help. Oh what am I saying...this is Nancy. Please Frank, I need you.'_

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__**Comments? Suggestions? Please Read & Review the chapter. I'll have the next up asap! :)**


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